Batavia’s City Attorney is recommending that City Council take no action to on a local law to restrict where sex offenders can live.
George Van Nest writes in a memo to council that any local law restricting where registered sex offenders can live will likely be targeted for a legal challenge and that could get expensive.
"In the event a law is passed and the city takes enforcement action and a party challenges the law," Van Nest wrote, "it is like that the city will be forced to expend resources defending a law that will ultimately be deemed ineffective."
Van Nest cited a number of local laws around the state, including one in Binghamton, that prohibited all Level 2 and 3 sex offenders from living with a quarter mile of a school or day care center.
A challenge to the constitutionality of the law was filed and while the case was pending, Binghamton rescinded the law in the belief it would loose the challenge.
Batavia City Councilwoman Rose Mary Christian had asked Van Nest to research local laws that would place limits on where sex offenders could live.